Love this club

LA Galaxy boss Arena calls for more efficient youth development

LA Galaxy head coach Bruce Arena believes US Soccer needs to improve the way they develop young players who are not ready for first team minutes.

The current process of plonking talented youngsters in the MLS Reserve League - where they will play 10 lowkey matches - is not doing enough to fast track the growth of players under the age of 21.

Arena suggests that Major League Soccer and US Soccer needs to have a look at the way the promising talent of American soccer are developed as they seem to be far behind players of the same age in Europe and Mexico.

"We're inefficient in how we allocate resources in the academy," Arena told The Washington Post this season.

"There's a likely argument where you can say we have improved the ability to move kids to the age of 17 or 18. Where do they go from there? It's a black hole.

"It's insane. We should have a USL-type of league (to develop players). Right now, the kids would be better off going to college and then we are back to the same thing again."